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In the world of hot-dog vending, Jilary and Ronald are unusual bosses: Unlike most other managers, they work alongside the four or so employees they have set up along the Embarcadero, slinging bacon-wrapped hot dogs with onions and peppers to tourists and passers-by for $10 a pop.
Most of the other managers, according to the vendors who work for them, never even show up except to collect their share of profits.
But even showing up each day, Jilary and Ronald eke out a living: The pair of owners typically make $1,000 to $1,500 a week after covering the cost of food and transportation. It’s a precarious investment, one at constant risk of being swept up by the city.
“Hot dogs aren’t a stable salary,” Ronald said, speaking in Spanish like other vendors. Sometimes, they only sell a couple, or none at all: This week they can’t sell, as the Embarcadero is partially blocked off for the Asia-Pacific Economic Conference. Other times, they stand to make a lot more. During fleet week, Ronald said he earned $2,000 just in one day.
The job is hardscrabble: Multiple hot dog vendors in San Francisco said they pay upwards of 55 percent to the owners of their carts. With typical sales of $150 a day, that leaves them with around $70 for some six or seven hours’ work — an hourly wage of $10 at most.
“Selling on the streets isn’t for everyone,” said Ronald, who has worked by the Embarcadero for a little over a year.
In fact, it appears to be mostly for newly arrived immigrants, who rarely appear to stay at the job longer than six months.
Income from selling hot dogs is very unstable — and many vendors fear the city’s crackdown on street vending: The Department of Public Health has impounded 40 carts this year so far, according to a spokesperson from the department, including eight of Jilary and Ronalds’ carts in September.
“Can you imagine, from one day to the next, they appear and take away everything you have earned until now? Just imagine,” said Jilary.
San Francisco police officers and other city employees in yellow vests took their carts off the sidewalk, Jilary said. A fine of $300 per cart had to be paid to get them back, she said.
At Pier 33, Ronald and some three or four vendors set up their carts along the sidewalk. It is here that they wait for the ferries that disembark some 19 times a day on weekdays, six times on weekends. They arrive early, in time for the first departure at 8:40 a.m., and stay late, until the last boat arrives at 6:30 p.m.
Once each ferry moors, a wave of tourists quickly passes through a waft of grilled meat. Vendors turn their gas burners on; sausages sizzle. They shout “Hot dog!” in a bid to win over customers, competing with other hawkers and riders offering city tours on their bikes. Moments — and a handful of hot dogs — later, the sidewalk is quiet again.
Many vendors are undocumented and readily acknowledge their lack of papers. Jilary and Ronald, for instance, met in Nicaragua on their way into the United States, which they entered in August 2022.
Jilary started working by the entrance to the Alcatraz Ferry near Pier 33 shortly thereafter, and soon helped set up stalls for other vendors, who had also recently arrived in the country. She helps them get a start, she said. “Que viene de sufrir igual de nosotros.” “They have suffered as much as we have.”
Few stay long. Instead, it appears that selling hot dogs along the Embarcadero is a first job for many an immigrant — and, most often, one left as soon as a better paying job can be found: Of their some six employees, the longest-serving, Santos, has been on the job for around a year.
Santos said he had tried to look for work in restaurants, but as an undocumented person, he said hot-dog selling is his only option.
He purchased his own cart for $400, after Jilary and Ronaldo’s carts were impounded in September, and went back to work for them under their previous revenue sharing: 50 percent of earnings go to him, the rest goes to Jilary and Ronald to cover transportation.
That leaves him with about $400 a week to cover his costs, including his $500 monthly rent in a room shared with three people near the Civic Center, and to make a small dent in repaying the loan he took out to be smuggled into the country: $22,000, borrowed to fund his journey from Yucatán, with a steep $1,000 a month in interest. “Uno se preocupa,” he said. “One worries.”
For other hot dog vendors along the Embarcadero, their managers aren’t so generous. Some get a 45 percent cut — others even as low as 30 percent — and their earnings go to a manager they likely have never met.
“Si dios quiere, que se venda todo,” said Rosie, another vendor, looking at some 10 hot dogs she had already grilled for the day. “God willing, everything will sell.”
Rosie moved to the United States from Peru some three months ago. For a couple of weeks, she was grilling hot dogs by Pier 35 and Fisherman’s Wharf, while her boss took 55 percent of her income.
Two weeks later, over the phone, Rosie said she was no longer at the Embarcadero. Instead, she found a job cleaning office spaces at night, for $18 an hour, 24 hours a week. “Más tranquila me siento,” she said. “I feel calmer.”
But others aren’t so lucky. They are still waiting, selling hot dogs or, if the opportunity presents itself, additional items, like fruits or beverages.
“Here, you don’t ask for work, you don’t ask for money. But you create your work and your income,” said a vendor, Milca.
Why aren’t these hot dog carts registered with the city?
Who are the bosses? Why are they allowed to pimp out undocumented people and sicken tourists with unregulated food?
“$10 a pop”
Who in their right mind would spend $10 for one of these dirty dogs? Then again I suppose most dirty dog customers aren’t in their right minds…
Who do you sue when you get food poisoning?San Francisco for allowing food to be served??The idea of eating a $10 hot dog is insane.Where are their resale licenses to collect sales tax??The morons in the board of health are allowing disease to be spread. This needs to end now.Profiting off the vendors is disgusting and they should all be eliminated.
Calm down, fella. There is no “Board of Health.”
JE
Mr. Eskenazi,
How do you know it is a fella?
What is wrong with ‘his’ outrage?
Although there is no ‘Board of Health’ there IS a Department of Public Health–you are splitting hairs.
Nice try.
Frank —
Okay, the fulminating lady or gentleman with the stuck question mark key is a beacon of enlightenment. Really added to the conversation.
JE
These are payday loan rates! $1k a month in interest on a $22k loan.
“…make a small dent in repaying the loan he took out to be smuggled into the country: $22,000, borrowed to fund his journey from Yucatán, with a steep $1,000 a month in interest. “
What’s the deal with the politics of guilt tripping where the circumstance of those already here has been deteriorating unchecked for decades with no consideration from government other than contempt, and we’re expected to roll over and accommodate migrants by blowing through progressive era public health regulations?
I could see the role of US policy in pushing Mesoamericans to migrate to the US, but someone migrating from Peru three months ago? C’mon, how is it politically salient to be responsive to the tribulations of a 3 month migrant given the background context of non-responsive, contemptuous political consideration for everyone else?
If the guilt trippers ever ran out of designated “most vulnerable,” they’d have to invent even more appalling virtual lepers whose feet they can perform the cleaning of to avoid confronting the plight of the precariat.
People are claiming they get sick off. A $10 hot dog. You can get sick at a restaurant. I got sick one time to eat out of a local restaurant so you got a health inspector checking your food. They are still no guaranteed and again. These people work extremely hard. They do not ask for handouts like most Americans look in the Streets and see what kind of people are had asking for Money. That’s right, it’s an American.
There are consequences for licensed food establishments, from hot dog stands to five star restaurants if people get sick eating food served at those facilities. First of all word of mouth will result in a decline in customers, resulting in that venue going out of business for a lack of customers. Secondly a person who gets sick from eating food will likely make a call to the Dept of Public Health that could shut a food establishment down resulting in expensive fines. A lady who is a US citizens with an East Bay licensed BBQ business tried setting up a stand in front of Herbst Theatre. She disappeared after a few weeks. She responded to an email saying that The City said that she could not sell food on the block of the Fine Arts buildings unless she obtained multiple permits costing over a thousand dollars, and that it would be unlikely a food vending permit would be issued to anyone for that location. Hard working people who, for whatever reason are caught driving without a driver’s license valid registration and current proof of insurance have their vehicles seized. Why shouldn’t the same apply to unlicensed street vendors?
I’ve no issues with street food. I’m glad to see someone trying to make a living somehow in this stupidly expensive city.
If you have issues with street foods, then don’t buy from them. All those turning this into a big thing, should find something more useful to do with their lives.
This is so naive.
You appear to believe that citizens should have no say over what happens in their neighborhoods. That is wrong. Citizens are entitled to express concerns on everything from a bar’s music being too loud or the offensiveness of a library’s possessions. We have zoning laws setting heavy restrictions on where an office building and a gentleman’s club can be built. In some municipalities, it would be impossible to build something higher than five stories. If I need a permit to build a swimming pool in my backyard, then you definitely need a permit to prepare and sell food.
Is “trying to make a living” something that the cartels came up with? Because these people on the streets making food are probably not doing what they do voluntarily. If they were, we would see more high school and college streets doing what these people do instead of working at Starbucks and Chipotle. Multiple reports show that they are (1) working less than the minimum wage and (2) working under duress. In addition, what is happening is pure robbery, as one can eat a burrito in Tijuana for $4 to $5, half of what these illegal vendors charge.
Government at all levels need to take a zero-tolerance approach to this infestation of inefficient, primitive, and criminal economic activity on our sidewalks. If the government is unable or unwilling to perform its duty to the citizenry, then it would be reasonable to expect things to get ugly.
We have many 7-Eleven locations where people can get delicious hot dogs, pizza, and other hot foods late night. Actual hard-working folks who work day-and-night operate these great America establishments. So, these illegal vendors are not filling some void the way farm workers do.
Somehow, one doubts that these people are paid no less than approximately $15 per hour as required in California. Yet, they often charge more than Taco Bell’s $1.80 for one taco. Even more remarkably, Costco’s food court sells one hot dog for only $1.50, whereas these illegal vendors refuse to negotiate on their outrageous prices of $10 for one hot dog. They communicate the illusion that they are just mom & pop establishments, but in reality, they are working for someone, perhaps with links to the cartels.
These illegal sidewalk establishments are parasitical in that that are not paying rent for being in close proximity to commercial real estate. They are not paying taxes that fund our infrastructure, police, and health care system. Instead of selling rubbish on the streets, they could be engaged in useful work such as construction or cleaning houses. Unless proven otherwise with strong data, their food is presumed unsafe because of the unsanitary conditions in which they work. Their smells injure people and the smoke can give one asthma attacks.
While folks in America build great, successful companies like Chipotle and Taco Bell, people elsewhere engage in barbaric activities such as operating illegal restaurants on the sidewalk. Chipotle should be a Guadalajara-based company, not one built by a Steve Ells.
They should have a vegan option.
$10 hr BUT they don’t pay taxes, don’t pay for permits, don’t pay for rent–SO, that 10$ hr is more like 25$ an hr.